What a Difference a Day Made
by Roofran411
Summary: Kate has agreed to marry Petruchio. She has invited him to her home to talk about debts and weddings but he wants to talk about herand her money.


Again I have put in things for which there is no basis but which I feel may explain a lot about Kate. Some Rooftoppers may recognise part of Petruchio's song. I used to have part of it with my avatar.

Again everything is down to William Shakespeare and Sally Wainwright.

The song I feel fits this story completely is "What a Difference a Day Made" sung by Jamie Cullum

"What a difference a day made,

24 little hours

Brought the sun and the flowers

Where there used to be rain.

My yesterday was blue dear

Today I'm part of you dear.

My lonely nights are through dear

Since you said you were mine.

What a difference a day made

There's a rainbow before me

Skies above can't be stormy

Since that moment of bliss

That thrilling kiss.

It's heaven when you

Find romance on your menu

Oh! What a difference a day made

And the difference is you.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MADE

Saturday

"Have you got all your papers" I asked him. "All the bits from the bank and the Inland Revenue. Everything relating to it?

"Yes, at least I can get my hands on them quite quickly." he said.

"Get them together and bring over tomorrow. We can have a look and start getting things sorted out."

We were walking along the road towards my Chelsea house.

We had spent the day at Hazlington, and then had had dinner together in a restaurant near my place. We had arrived at 7 pm and were still talking about everything but us and his proposition, when they started to clear the tables prior to closing.

When I made up my mind.

No, not true, I think I had made up my mind the day before in St James's Park when I began to fall in love with him, but ever the politician, I had be cautious, but at last in the restaurant, I had said " I think we had better talk about your proposition."

His face which had been so alive and mobile became still and guarded. Watchful.

"Let's talk basics. You need a wife with money, to get you out of your difficulties, pay your debts, and put your house to rights.

What I need, because my Party thinks it necessary, is a husband to be beside me, to support me, put in an appearance as and when needed. Who is not going to damage my image. Well you know."

We looked at each other; both of us, watchful.

"We both know what we need. Do we know what we want? What I want to know is what sort of a marriage you want. Is it going to be the sort of marriage where we both turn up when wanted and then disappear until the next time? Or do you want a real marriage?"

He was looking down, then he picked up my hands, holding them, gently rubbing my fingertips with his.

"I don't think you have been listening to a word I've said." He looked up at me and his eyes glinted green.

"I love you and I want to marry you and by that I mean I want a marriage in every sense of the word."

I went on looking at our hands and then I said "Then ...in that case, I _will_ marry you."

He gave a whoop of joy and slipped around the table onto one knee and still holding both my hands kissed them gurgling with joy and laughter.

"Kate, Kate."

"Get up! Get up you idiot!" I hissed as the waiter arrived.

"Is everything alright sir?" the waiter asked.

"Everything is very alright! The lady has agreed to marry me." he said.

We left the restaurant, on that cold, clear night, and walked along the road to my house. He was like an exuberant puppy, bouncing like Tigger.

"Soon?" he asked.

"Well yes." I said."We both need it to be soon as possible. We'll have to get things sorted out. Book things. Sort the Inland Revenue. "

Have you got the papers to hand? Everything? Bring them over in the morning, we'll try and get things together. Come early. I'll cook us breakfast."

He looked at me.

"_Can_ you cook?"he said, surprise in his voice.

"Well, I can do a mean full English, but that's about all. And don't go expecting it all the time."

We got to the steps of my house.

I was NOT asking him in. I stood on the top step and when he stood on the one below me I was almost the same height and his mouth was just above mine.

"It's late." I said.

He moved to kiss me and as our mouths touched I backed away pressing him back.

"Please. _Please_, don't rush me. I hardly know you." and I was humiliated to hear my voice shaking. His face was in the shadow but he hadn't moved very far away. I could feel his breath just below my ear.

" I think we know each other very well Kate." he said and I could feel rather than see his smile. Then he went down a step, then another and I could see him now, his smile, and his eyes gleamed green in the street light.

I went to my door and opened it.

"Goodnight, my love, see you in the morning." He went to the bottom step and turning, waited till I went in and closed the door

I bolted it and leaned against it and then I heard someone singing, a lovely light tenor. Him, singing, to me. A very old song;

_"And when I tell them how wonderful you are,_

_They'll never believe me"_

And as he moved away from the house he went on

"_Your lips, your eyes, your cheeks, your hair _

_Are in a class beyond compare._

_You're the loveliest girl that one could see_"

And he went on singing this lovely old song

"And_ when I tell them_

_And I'm certainly going to tell them _

_That I'm the boy whose wife one day you'll be"_

as he went along the road and inside, I leaned against my door and listened to him and my heart was singing too.

"_They'll never believe me _

_They'll never believe me _

_That from this great big world you've chosen me."_

I went to bed not knowing how I felt but not expecting to sleep. I slept as soon as my head hit the pillow.

I woke early in the morning, bright, elated.

I got up and looked in the fridge to see what I had for breakfast. Nothing, so I took myself off to the corner shop down the road.

He arrived about a quarter to ten and I took him into the kitchen.

"What would you like? Full English? Bacon, eggs, sausage?"

"Ummm. Nice place. Is it yours?"

"Yeah. Mushrooms, tomato, black pudding?"

"Oh yes, please. How long have you had it?"

"Sit down. Oh, I bought when I was elected, about 11yrs now. The basement is my constituency office."

I didn't usually use a tablecloth, not just for me but I had laid the table beautifully. _The lot. _All my best stuff that I never used.

I said "Orange juice?" I put it in front of him and got on with cooking.

"Tea or coffee?"

"Oh tea for breakfast" he said.

As I finished dishing up I slipped a slice of bread into the pan and then gave it to him.

"Fried bread!" He gurgled with delight. "How wonderful."

I ate mine while I watched in amazement at how much he put away.

"Toast? There's jam or marmalade or honey if you'd rather."

Three slices followed by 3 cups of tea with sugar! And he hadn't an ounce spare flesh on him!

He helped me clear the table, I stacked the dishwasher and we went into the living room. He got out all the papers,Inland Revenue, solicitors et al.

I was looking through them, when he said "Do you know I don't know anything about you?"

I pressed my lips together trying not to smile.

"You said you had eyes." He was doing the same, trying not smile.

"Tell me Kate. Tell me about _you,_ Kate"

"There's not much to tell. One mother, one sister, MP for Chelsea. I live here in Chelsea... I don't know; what more do you want to know? Ask me."

"O.K. Most important!" he was laughing now. "Where did you get your money from?"

I kicked off my shoes and sat on my feet in the corner of the sofa. He sat on the floor across from me.

"Family." I said.

"Minola. The Italian textile manufacturers? My father was the younger son. We, my mother, Bianca and I have shares and he set up trust funds for us when we were born."

"How did he meet your mother, I mean she's not Italian, is she?"

"He came to England to study British manufacturing. They met at her sixteenth birthday party. Love at first sight."

"How old was _he_?"

"Twenty." I moved a bit uneasily, brought my knees up and rested my head against them.

There were some things that were private. Looking up I found he was watching me. I hid my face against my knee.

"They met and they had each other within half an hour ...would have been sooner if they could have got away. Behind the blue velvet curtains in the library in my grandparents house. They were married four months later and I was born five months after that."

"She tell you that?"

"No, Bianca. I mean, she told Bianca and Bianca told me."

What was it about him? What made me tell him all that!

"Did they live happily ever after?"

"Well I suppose so. Yes they did until he died, when I was twelve. Heart attack. Yes, they must have, she never married again. Oh, she's had boyfriends but nobody, no, nobody really."

"He left her comfortably off then?"

"Umm, yes, there were his trust fund and shares and his insurance as well. And of course there's her family money, she's a Courtauld. That was how they met; he came to Courtaulds on some sort of exchange. Bianca and I have Courtauld shares and money too."

"What about you? Where did you go to school?

"I went to Hill House until I was 13, then I went to Roedean, then on to Cambridge."

"What did you read?"

"Politics and economics. Worked at the Conservative Party offices in the vacs. And when I graduated, I worked for the BBC in the political side of the news dept, until I was elected and have been at Westminster ever since."

"How old were you? I mean when you were elected?"

"27"

"How old are you now?"

"38"

"When's your birthday?"

"24th November."

"Do you smoke?"

"No, not now, not since Uni. Do you?"

"No, gave it up years ago. Drink?

"Well, socially, and well, now and then, if I feel like it".

"What about boyfriends?"

"You know... no one important." I shrugged.

No one important, HAH! No one at all but I wasn't going to tell him that, I have my pride.

"Nothing much to tell. Head down, worked."

He looked at me, and I looked at him, wondering what he was thinking. Looking into those big green eyes, I had to close my eyes in case he could see what I was feeling. Feeling that jolt of electricity to my groin, that wanting I had felt last night, wanting him to kiss me, to hold me, to touch me.

I must move, I must get up and as I moved, he did too, kneeling so close in front of me, his eyes level with mine, his mouth inches away, and his arms gently around me. Oh, he knew, he knew!

"Kate"he said softly, barely above a whisper.

"Kate, I want you." and he kissed the space below my ear and down the curve of my jaw saying over and over. "Kate, Kate, Kate."

" Please. Please, it's too soon," my voice was ragged and so I did my old trick when uncertain, when nervous, when not in control, and I straightened my back and sharpened my voice to my dealing with difficult opponents tone.

"Let us be quite clear, here and now! I am not going to sleep with you, _not_ now, _not_ until we are married."

He rested his forehead against mine and laughed a little soft gentle gurgle of a laugh and loosened his arms a little but not enough to let me go.

"Kate! Oh Kate!" and brushed his lips against mine and I began to shake. If he lets me go I will fall over, I thought.

"My lovely Kate," he said."You have no idea; have you, no idea at all?

"I think I will make a cup of tea or would you have rather coffee?" I stood up; he followed me out to the kitchen.

I saw on the hall table the half empty box of papers he had brought with him.

"We have to get all this sorted out. Is everything there?"

"When are we going to get married Kate?"

I turned to face him and that bloody strand of hair fell over my face and he reached out and gently pushed it back behind my ear, and smiled.

"When?

"Well as far as I 'm concerned as soon as possible." I said.

He smiled again, a naughty knowing smile.

"Yes, as soon as possible." he said.

God, that was not how I meant it. Did everything have to have sexual connotations? Yes, yes because that was how it was between us. Sex. He wanted me, and I wanted him. He knew it before I did.

I said coolly, "I meant I have a campaign to run and this is an essential part of that campaign. So as soon as we can arrange it; and if we are not to have the Inland Revenue or the bankruptcy court or anybody else arriving in the middle of everything, we have to get these debts sorted out So is this everything?"

"Yes."

"All the details? All the letters and bank statements and such?" he nodded.

"Right, I will sort all this out tomorrow. We can go over it later to make sure I've got everything right.

Look,_ I_ can sort all this out tomorrow. I _have_ to go into the House. Things to do, if we're going to get things moving. Can I leave it with you to sort out the wedding, bookings and so on?"

He nodded, and we went back to the living room with our tea. We sat side by side on the sofa.

"What do you want me to do?

"Let's make a list for you to do."

I gave him a pad and pen and he wrote everything down. He had surprisingly small neat writing; somehow I had expected it to be big, sprawling, and indecipherable.

"Book the register office."

"Ah. No. Church... Do you mind?"

"Not in the slightest. Do you go? To church, I mean?"

"Not as often as I should, but my family, the Minolas, would be upset if I didn't. My Nonna, my grandmother that is, would be very upset."

"OK. Book church, we'll have to find out about a special licence."

"If you go to the church, St Luke's around the corner, they will be able to tell you what's needed."

"Right! What sort of do? Do you want keep it quiet or have a big one? You'll have to pay."

"I only intend to get married once so I would like a nice one. Not necessarily an enormous one, but yes something nice.

"What about the reception? Claridge's, the Savoy?

"I've always fancied the Ritz. When I was little, my dad used to take us there for tea as a treat and I always thought when I'm grownup and getting married, I would have it there."

"Right, the Ritz. What next?"

"Flowers."

"Where?"

"Oh there a nice little place around the corner, try there.

"Cars? Limo? "

"You will have to sort out the church before you do anything else, to have the date and so on"

"What about a honeymoon, Kate?"

"Where would you like to go? Any ideas?"

"You'll be paying."

"But where do _you_ fancy, I've chosen everything else. Would you like to go anywhere particular? Caribbean ...Maldives...Dubai?"

"I've always wanted to go to Italy, I've never been. You must know it very well, so if you would rather go somewhere else? "

"No, I'm having the choice of everything else so, if you want to go to Italy, we'll go. So...city, country, hotel, villa?"

"I think a villa would be nice for a honeymoon. Tuscany? Pisa? "

"Right, we'll have a look for somewhere on-line afterwards."

"It's getting exciting, isn't it?"

He put his arm around me and we sat together and then I leaned against him and it felt right.

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End file.
